Privacy policy

Aster collects no data. Your photos, your edits and your searches stay on your Mac.

• Aster has no account, no analytics, no advertising and no tracking. It does not send crash reports of its own.
• Your photos and their information (EXIF, GPS position, titles, keywords) are never sent anywhere.
• Everything is computed on your Mac: RAW development, retouching, the automatic masks for people, skin, subject and sky, healing, search.
• Edits and metadata are written to XMP files next to your photos. Aster also keeps an index and thumbnails on your Mac, in its own container, to stay fast; they can be rebuilt from your folders at any time.
• To reopen the folders you chose, Aster stores sandbox bookmarks in its preferences on your Mac.
• The only network access is the update of the Lensfun lens database, used for lens corrections. About once a week, Aster downloads the public database from lensfun.github.io (or its mirror wilson.bronger.org). The request contains no information about you or your photos. You can turn it off in Aster's Settings.
• Purchases are handled by Apple through the App Store; Aster receives no payment details.

Last updated: 25 October 2026.

Contact: Jean-Christophe Baptiste — aster@jcbaptiste.com · Support